


Fine Dwarven Stout

by wyrdo



Series: Liars, Damn Liars, and Seekers of Truth [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angry Inquisitor (Dragon Age), Cassandra is not as Disgusted as she Expected, F/M, Sera Pulls a Prank
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-20
Updated: 2018-07-20
Packaged: 2019-06-12 06:13:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15333585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wyrdo/pseuds/wyrdo
Summary: Varric is screwed.  It's not bad enough he pissed of the Inquisitor to the point of her yelling at him for ten minutes outside the Singing Maiden, but apparently Sera is trying to get into her good graces because what he found in his footlocker to put on this morning is NOT what he put into it last night.Well, Shit.





	Fine Dwarven Stout

**Author's Note:**

> Weird plot bunny that hit me when i read a different but very similar story on AO3
> 
> I took that and added Sera and Bull and an angry Herald in order to tip the silly scale
> 
> As for the title, well...think of the dwarf in Denerim in origins. "Dwarven Steel, Fine Dwarven Steel!" I can't get it out of my head now that I thought of it.
> 
> And on the topic of hands, i may have recently seen Willow again and I may have had a teen-age crush on Warwick Davis, He's not Varric in any other way, but i'm pretty sure i am absolutely in love with his hands. So i gave them to Varric. Sorry Warwick. Say thank-you Varric. 
> 
> I was holding this for later, but i'm not sure there will be more on this, i can't think what it would be, so i got it down now :)

_Not just Fuck,_ Varric thinks, _But Fu-uh-uh-uh-uhk._

He stood in front of his footlocker, in his tent, in Haven, five minutes after he is supposed to be at the gate to head to the far end of Orlais to figure out why some jackass killed a bazillion tranquil and stuck their heads on poles.

In his hands was a rather complex and entirely confusing mess of harnesses, straps and string. Primary colors were an odd blue grey and red.

This was not what he put in the footlocker last night. Last night, what went in was an old school Carta coat they'd liberated from a dead dwarf on the Storm Coast. The coat had been brown and white. Well, it had been white once, now it was a sort of mossy cream. He hadn't really liked the coat, but it covered everything. He was pretty sure that if he DID figure out how to put this on, his nipples would be visible.

In fact, he's pretty sure he saw something like this on an archer serving the Arishok back in Kirkwall.

It's kind of sad, Varric was pretty sure he and Sera would get along well, but, instead she seemed to think that the 'Merchant Prince' thing was more than a metaphor. So she, what? needed him to be people?

He rather wished she'd stolen his pants.

Instead she stole not just his armor, but everything he didn't sleep in, leaving him with nothing but whatever this is. Even in this weather in Haven, Varric didn't wear anything else to sleep in. He was a furnace, if he wore something to bed, it would be soaked in the morning. Might as well just sleep in his underthings.

 _Andraste's dusky brown nipples._ Varric was fucked

Varric sighed. When one is made the butt of a joke, one must own it.

He did his best to figure out the straps and ropes and leather gauntlets, but five minutes later, and ten minutes late, he heard the Iron Bull outside the tent "Varric, the Herald is getting even more annoyed. You in there?"

Varric froze. Then he sneezed. "Piss" he said under his breath.

"Varric?"

"Uhm. Yeah. Can I get a hand?"

Bull's giant frame filled the tiny doorway of his little tent. His horns wouldn't fit. For expediency's sake, the big galoot simply lifted the tent so that he could fit his horns in.

Then The Iron Bull laughed good and hard. For a full two minutes. Complete with a couple thigh smacks and some rocking that threatened the viability of the tent.

Varric gave his friend a dirty look.

Finally, while wiping tears from his big stupid eye, he got control of his voice. "The fuck did you get that?"

Varric waved toward his footlocker.

Bull twisted his head, trying to peer into the footlocker and nearly poking a hole in the top of Varric's tent. "Horns Bull!" Varric shouted.

"Shit, sorry. Where's that coat you had on yesterday?"

"You know how the Inquisitor is pissed at me?" Varric asked

Bull nodded.

"You know how Sera is trying to get in her pants?"

Another nod.

"That."

"That makes no sense." Bull said.

"Have you met Sera?"

"Hmm." Bull nodded. Then he inspected Varric "You're wearing it wrong."

"I figured." Varric said. "It's Qunari right? Can you help me fix it?"

"Yeah." The work of a few moments had Varric at least not constricted to the point of being unable to fight.

"Try not to freeze to death." Bull rumbled at him.

"Time to face the music." Varric sighed.

Bull nodded and pulled his head and shoulders out of the tent. Shockingly enough, when he was done, the tent still stood.

Varric squared his shoulders and marched out the door.

"You do know she did you a favor right?" Bull asked

"How so?" Varric asked ascerbically.

"Pretty sure that old coat of yours won't protect you half as well as an Antaam-saar. It's worn by 2/3 of the Antaam archers."

"Sure," Varric said, "Provided they hit me in the middle of the chest or in the middle of the back."

"Or your wrists" Bull supplied helpfully.  

As he and Bull waited for the gate to open so they could join the rest of the team, Varric tapped his foot. He would straighten this out as soon as he saw the Herald. No problem.

\--------

  
Cassandra and the Herald waited outside the stable, while two grooms held Bull and Varric's horses.

"Herald," Varric's voice boomed from the newly open gate. "A word?"

"Finally," The Herald said between clenched teeth. "Let's go. It takes over a week to get there." She didn't even look his way, clicking her tongue to signal her mount toward the bridge.

Sera cackled madly from where she lounged against the stable fence. "Oh, yeah. Now you're people again."

"People?" Cassandra said turning on her horse to look at the late comers before she followed the Inquisitor.

"Varric?" she said shocked. His face was miserable, but he still moved gracefully, not unlike every rogue she'd ever seen, she reminded herself. The problem was, no rogues she had ever seen was so exposed. His abdominal muscles rippled as he walked, moving like no man she'd ever seen. She realized how much core was required to walk as softly as he did.

Dwarves were supposed to be stout. They were supposed to be dense. They were...they were supposed to be well padded. Soft stomached to match their breadth. Jiggly. Not...

In the light of what she was seeing, She revised her notion of what was under all that silk and padded leather Varric usually wore. She'd assumed he was, well, chubby. But the man had arms like Bull's, and Maker's sake, his abs. She counted eight visible abdominal muscles, although the bottom one was just a hint, dripping below the waistband of whatever it was he was wearing, and she was pretty sure she could see the line of demarcation between his transverse abdominus and his obliques.

He adjusted his.. rigging? uncomfortably and her attention was drawn to his hands. She'd noticed them a long time ago.  When he was repeating Hawke's for her back in Kirkwall keeping her from being here in Haven before the moment of the event.  They were not as she'd expected the hands of a dwarf to be.  His fingers were elegant and longer than hers, she'd noticed then, and on several days since.  But in combination with those rippling abs....

 _Holy Maker's Cleansing Fire_. she thought. Unable to get the idea of Varric and she in compromising positions out of her mind. Would his abs ripple like that? Where would his elegant fingers be.

Bull vaulted onto his Bog Unicorn and pulled up beside Cassandra.

"You're drooling." he mumbled.

Cassandra made a disgusted noise and turned her horse toward the bridge. She was certain her face was pink. In fact, she was pretty sure she could melt a barrel of snow with her face.

Her mind elsewhere, she let her mount fall behind while Bull caught up with the Herald.

She saw Varric pull up beside her on his stout pony.

"What are you doing?" she hissed at him.

"I'm pretty sure i'm riding to the Hissing wastes." his smirk lacked power but it was still there.

Cassandra groaned again. "What are you wearing?" she tried a different question.

"My just deserts" he smiled a bit brighter.

Cassandra suppressed an urge to punch him in his stupid face. Maker's sake, was he trying to annoy her? She kicked her horse and pulled up behind Bull and the Herald.

Behind her, Varric chuckled.

"You'll either freeze or burn in that, dwarf." she said over her shoulder, trying to reach equilibrium. Trying not to think of licking the demarcations between his abdominals and obliques.  Of maybe following that lower one somewhere very interesting.

"Don't I know it." he sounded miserable again. Cassandra did a double take, slowing her mount again.

"Then why are you wearing it?"

Varric opened his mouth to say something smart, then closed it.  "I was apparently not people." he said.  "Sera felt I needed a comeuppance. If I know her as well as I think, either you or the Herald has my armor in their saddle bags, or possibly being used as a saddle blanket."

"Ah?" Cassandra grunted questioningly.  

Varric gave her an embarassed grin.

"Andraste's blessed Mother!" the Herald shouted, finally catching sight of Varric. "What the blazes are you wearing?"


End file.
